Bread of Heaven

As the rest of us recover from St David’s Day festivities, Helen Thompson discovers the history behind Wales’ national day

By Helen Thompson

Patron saints suffer in St Patrick’s shadow; they are often forgotten next to the revelry that takes place on St Paddy’s Day.

Wales’ patron saint is remembered in a less inebriated manner, as a celebration of Welsh culture on March 1. In the afternoon of St David’s Day 2006, Cardiff City Centre was taken over by a parade of people in traditional dress, driving floats, carrying national flags and playing music, to ensure that no-one in the city could ignore St David’s Day.

Since his adoption as patron saint of Wales in the 18th Century, patriots have reinforced their links to Welsh culture on this day.

Bethan James, a Cardiff University student, remembers looking forward to the celebrations at school: “We all used to love dressing up; we’d have the day off school, all the classrooms would be used for different activities.

“The girls wore full national dress, and the boys wore rugby shirts and jeans, until we got to Year Five or Year Six, when it wasn’t ‘cool’ for the girls to still be wearing their full costume – so we’d wear rugby shirts and jeans too.

“In secondary school, there would be an Eisteddfod each year. The sixth form would teach the younger years new songs and dances, and the different houses would compete against each other for points, and to become the winner.”

In Welsh schools and Sunday schools, the life of St David, or Dewi Sant, is still taught to children through numerous stories. He was a man who reputedly restored a dead youth to life, and whose path was marked by springs that spontaneously appeared where his feet had fallen.

His was a Wales that had been Romanised after the defeat of the woad-painted Celts; their blue-tinged skin had terrified the ranks of Caesar’s army, but they had eventually been overcome by the Romans’ superior military skill.

The sixth-century countryside was littered with reminders of the past, from the vast stone Megaliths of the Neolithic Age to the hill-forts of the Iron Age.

At the time of David’s birth, Christianity was a relatively new concept in Britain. It had only been introduced after the edict of 400 AD that made Christianity the only official religion of the Roman Empire.

David took it upon himself to spread the faith among the pagan Celts of South West Britain, driving the traditional Celtic Gods back into the hills, where they were mostly forgotten, but lived on to reappear spectrally in the fiction of later ages.

It is possible that David was of noble origins, as legend has it that his mother, Non, was a niece of King Arthur and that his father was son of the Prince of Ceredigion.

The blind monk Paulinus taught the young David in preparation for his missionary journeys that took him through Wales, South West England, Cornwall and Brittany, erecting churches and spreading Christianity on his way.

St David is said to have died in 589 AD, having lived for over 100 years. His longevity could be attributed to his frugal lifestyle. He reputedly drank only water, earning himself the nickname Dewi Ddyfrwr – ‘David the waterman’ – and ate only bread and herbs.

This apparent lifestyle was somewhat undermined by the claim that he was also tall and strong, although he was certainly strong in mind. His love of water extended to a self-imposed penance of immersing himself up to his neck in cold water and reciting scripture.

The monastery that he founded near his birthplace at Glyn Rhosyn (‘rose vale’) on the banks of River Alun, where St David’s City stands today, adhered to his strict principles. His monks worked hard under his puritan gaze, ploughing, beekeeping, praying and caring for travellers and the poor.

Canonisation requires the performance of miracles, and David proved his worth at the Synod of Llanddewi Brefi, a meeting held to decide whether David should be made Archbishop of Wales. As he stood to give his speech, a member of the audience called out that those at the back would be unable to see or hear David. Immediately the ground rose until everyone could see and hear him speak.

That’s how the story goes, but it is all hearsay as nothing was actually recorded about David’s life until 500 years after his death, when Rhigyfarch wrote the Buchedd Dewi, from which most of our modern day information about David is derived.

It was after this work emerged that David was canonised in 1120, by Pope Callactus II, in view of the miraculous happenings that surrounded him. It is said that on the day of his death, his monastery filled with angels as Christ received his soul in heaven.

While David did a lot to erase the traditional religion of the Celts, he has since done much to maintain their language, by inspiring pride in Welsh culture.

Celtic was brought to Britain by migrants from the continent. Before the Romans took over, most of Northern Europe was dominated by a unified Celtic empire. Gradually this empire gave way to the Romans and the language of the Celts was effaced by those that stemmed from Latin, languages of authority and administration. Britain was one of the last countries to retain the Brythonic language that eventually became Welsh, Cornish and Breton.

By the end of David’s life, Britain had more or less divided itself into three distinct areas: the Teutonic East, the Britonic West and the Britonic-Pictish North.

The word Welsh was not applied to the people of this area until much later, by Saxon invaders who used it to denote people they considered foreign, or at least those who had been Romanised.

From 616, and the Battle of Chester, Wales was mainly independent and it is from this period that the Welsh language began to become distinguished from the older Brythonic language.

It was not long before the differences between England and Wales were emphasised by the creation of Offa’s Dyke, which runs from the north east to the south east coast of Wales. To cross the ramparts, for hundreds of years, meant bloody defiance.

St David has become synonymous with keeping Welsh culture alive. Now Welsh communities across the world will celebrate by performing a range of traditions, from eating a traditional meal of cawl to lighting the Empire State Building in the national colours red, green and white.

Many schoolchildren will still wear national dress, which consists of Welsh flannel overcoats, shirts, woollen socks and beaver hats, derived from traditional peasant dress amalgamated with 18th century fashions.

St David’s final sermon advised his congregation: “Be joyful and keep your faith and your creed. Do the little things that you have seen me do and heard about.”

This message has served as inspiration to many patriots since and it is still a well known Welsh phrase today that people should gwnewch y pethau bychain – “do the little things.”